Kent beat me by a few minutes, so I actually was "thirding" praise of 
Barb and the Elmira staff.

On 8/5/2013 7:13 PM, Kent Rasmussen wrote:
> I'm surprised I seem to have the honor of being the first person to echo
> Hal's thoughts (unless someone else beats me to it before this note goes
> online). It goes without saying that we all owe a big debt of gratitude t=
> o
> Barbara Snedecor, Christy Gray (why do my fingers insist on typing "Chris=
> ty
> Brown"?), and many others at the center for all their work. This was my
> fifth conference, and I've always been amazed at the amount of work that
> goes into them. The attention to detail is quite astounding.
>
> I got home to California very late last night and am still a little tired=
>
> and disoriented. Rather than try to sum up my feeling about the
> conference--except to say it was wonderful, perhaps the best yet, I'll
> follow Hal's lead by rattling off some random observations ...
>
> --I too was impressed by the Japanese contributions to the conference and=
>
> the dedication and energy the Japanese scholars put into their
> presentations. I counted ten Japanese paper presenters. Wouldn't it be
> something if that many people participated from each of many different
> countries!
>
> --I was fortunate to be in Elmira in May, when blooming flowers made the
> campus more beautiful than I had ever seen it, but it still looked awfull=
> y
> beautiful during the conference, which was blessed with cool weather. The=
>
> grounds of Quarry Farm also looked more beautiful than ever, thanks, I'm
> sure to Tim Morgan. And Hal is right about the view from there!
>
> --Speaking of the weather, the air conditioning in the new dormitory, Mei=
> er
> Hall, was almost too cold. Imagine that in Elmira! It's a wonderful,
> old-school-style building, by the way. Its spacious commons room has a ni=
> ce
> old-fashioned fireplace, by which John Bird read an unpublished (for now)=
>
> fairy tale by Mark Twain, and at least one aging scholar (if that's the
> correct) word comfortably drifted off to sleep.
>
> --I can't remember a conference with more papers that I wanted to hear. A=
> s
> virtually every time slot had concurrent sessions, I missed nearly half t=
> he
> presentations I wanted to attend. I've been lobbying Barbara to add anoth=
> er
> day to the conference to reduce the number of scheduling conflicts. Sure,=
>
> some people would miss sessions because they couldn't come on Wednesday .=
> ..
> but would that be any worse than missing them because of scheduling
> conflicts? Another suggestion I'd like to throw out is that it would be g=
> ood
> to have a web site where ALL conference papers would be posted. Not
> necessarily the scholars' full-length papers, but at least the truncated
> versions they present at the conferences.
>
> --I've been to Elmira seven times and was stunned to realize I had never
> before been inside Cowles Hall and seen its chapel! Its magnificent woodw=
> ork
> and stained-glass windows are gorgeous. Its acoustics aren't good for
> speakers, but no one visiting the campus should miss a chance to visit th=
> e
> chapel.
>
> --I'm not sure it's appropriate to single out individual papers for prais=
> e
> here, as I don't want to hurt the feelings of people I fail to mention. I=
> 'll
> merely say that keynote speaker Peter Kaminsky's praise of Horst Kruse's
> presentation was right on the money and that there were many, many fine
> papers at the conference.
>
> I'll end by enthusiastically seconding John Bird's call to everyone to
> attend the next conference at Hannibal in 2015. I'm not an officer of the=
>
> Mark Twain Circle, so I speak only for myself, but I'd like to see these
> conferences unified into a single-series biennial conference with
> alternating venues. Why not?
>
> Okay, I will single out another person. Mark Twain Project editor Ben
> Griffin's talk in the chapel about Mark Twain's "A Family Sketch" was
> wonderful--informative, fascinating, and occasionally hilarious. I hearti=
> ly
> concur with another attendee who suggested that perhaps he should have be=
> en
> the keynote speaker. Next time? Incidentally, Bob Hirst was no slouch of =
> a
> follow-up speaker.
>
> Kent Rasmussen
>